TALKING TACTICS: Nottingham Forest situation hard to fathom

Phil Smith

SCOUT Phil Smith looks at tonight’s opponents Nottingham Forest and their current struggles.

The situation at Nottingham Forest is one that I am struggling to comprehend.

How can you go from promotion contenders to a relegation battle in less than a year?

Their squad is excellent, so how do they find themselves in the bottom three?

In September, I drew the conclusion that Steve McClaren was to blame, his tenure as England manager was somewhat unsuccessful, so it wasn’t a leap of faith to suggest that the FC Twente gaffer was at fault. When you consider our failure to reach EURO 2008, he has a knack of failing to harness the ability of those under his care.

However, they have continued to struggle under Steve Cotterill, and it would be a stretch to suggest that both men are squarely to blame for their current predicament. His success rate of 27.28 is only marginally better than that of McClaren at 23.08. Granted, the style of football under our former boss was hardly going to be attractive, but I had no doubts whatsoever that results would begin to improve. Why haven’t they?

Alleged dressing room unrest could be to blame, but whether this can be classed as accurate remains to be seen, rumours of this nature tend to be thrown around when a team goes through a difficult patch.

What we can be absolutely certain of, however, is that Forest are in an absolute mess.

Traditionally, a trip to the City Ground would be classed as a challenge, but, given their form of late, anything less than three points would be a huge disappointment.

4-4-2 was the formation of choice against West Ham United, and I cannot fathom why this was the case, given their chosen starting XI.

They lack shape in midfield and will continue to struggle unless they deploy two wingers, a central creative force and a tough-tackling ball winner.